Yangon, Myanmar - International Medical Corps (IMC) has teamed up with a local non-governmental organization that has been working through close community ties in the country for several years focusing on livelihood, environmental and civil society projects. IMC and this group are now jointly assisting rice farmers to rebuild their lives in time for this year's planting season.
When cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar 130,000 people were killed or went missing. More than two million were in urgent need of assistance including food, shelter, medical care, and water and sanitation.
Immediately after Nargis hit the fertile delta area, International Medical Corps deployed an emergency response team to Myanmar and its local partner mobilized its staff and about 80 volunteers to bring food and other assistance to 143 villages in four delta townships (Bogale, Dedaye, Kon Chan Gone, and Pyapon). So far they reached 49,039 people in 11,428 families through life-saving handouts totaling over 7,000kg of rice, oil, salt, dried fish, beans, onions, and potatoes. The relief effort has mainly been financed through private donations and is now supported by IMC.
The storm devastated whole villages, destroyed houses, livestock and farming equipment. With only a few weeks left for preparing their paddies and getting rice seeds into the ground, International Medical Corps and its partner are focusing on rebuilding the farmer's capacity to be able to work their land and harvest crops later in the year. Through this initiative long-term food insecurity and a sharp drop in community income levels will hopefully be avoided.
International Medical Corps and its partner will provide farming equipment, including tractors to replace the water buffalos that died in the cyclone, fuel, and seeds. A village committee will be in charge of the equipment, making sure that as many people as possible will benefit from it.
International Medical Corps is also cooperating with the International Organization of Migration (IOM). IMC has received essential medicines, medical equipment, and relief supplies from MAP International for its emergency response, which will be used for humanitarian support with mobile clinics and mental health activities run by IOM's Yangon team in the affected areas of the delta. The MAP shipment will be handed over to IOM which has been working in the health sector in Myanmar for several years and was able to rapidly shift its ongoing operations to the hard-hit delta area.
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
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